


Milk and Honey

by kaeorin



Series: Loki's Lullabies [23]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Affection, Comfort, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Fluff, Massage, Touching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-18
Updated: 2020-04-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 05:34:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,518
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23709982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaeorin/pseuds/kaeorin
Summary: When you ask Loki to put some lotion on your back because you’re itchy, things get a little…deeper.
Relationships: Loki (Marvel)/Reader
Series: Loki's Lullabies [23]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1678240
Comments: 14
Kudos: 242





	Milk and Honey

Whether it was the increasing length of your daily showers, the increasing temperature of your daily showers, or the weird cold snap that had recently tried to blanket the city in snow, your skin was dry. You hated the way it stung. It made you want to jump out of your skin. So you started slathering yourself in lotion after your showers. It made it a little better, at least in the places you could reach. Even now, you still struggled a bit to get your own back. 

But, unlike this past winter, you were not living alone right now. It felt a little bit strange, asking Loki to do something as personal—but not sexual—as rubbing lotion on your back, but the itching felt even worse, so you wrapped yourself in your towel, grabbed your lotion, and gathered your courage.

“I need to ask for a favor,” you said when you stood in front of him. He allowed his eyes to travel up the length of your body, taking in the sight of you in nothing but a towel. When he finally reached your gaze, there was a hungry, appreciative gleam in his eyes. You shifted a bit and had to look away.

“Anything.” He sounded like he meant it. He sat forward a bit and spread his hands out as though presenting himself to you. “I am my lady’s humble servant. What will you ask of me?”

“No, it’s not like that...” You drew in a steadying breath. You’d always hated asking for help. At least with the big stuff, the stuff that made you actually need help, you didn’t feel this silly. But this was so minor, and certainly not life-or-death. And he was still gazing up at you with so much...affection. Finally, you held up the bottle of lotion and sort of cringed apologetically at him. “My skin is dry. Would you… Could you put this on my back?”

He laughed warmly and straightened his back as he reached for the bottle. “Of course, darling. What fool would pass up the chance to l their hands on you? Have a seat.” He turned to the side a bit, and indicated the space beside him on the couch. For all his teasing, he didn’t sound irritated by the request. After a bit of finagling with your towel so you could be partially covered without obscuring your back from him, you did sit.

Loki did not touch you for several long moments, even though you heard him dispense some lotion into his palms. You braced yourself for that quick, sharp shock of cold on your back, but it never came. The lotion was almost warm as he smoothed it along your skin. He’d let the warmth from his hands warm it. Another kind of warmth rushed through your body at the realization, and you longed to wrap your arms around him. 

He took a little longer than was probably necessary, until he was finally just caressing your back. It gave you chills, but in the best way. He had yet to say a word. Without truly meaning to, you called up a mental image of the way he’d just looked at you, the way he often looked at you in bed, and had to suppress a shiver. He often looked at you like he wanted to drink you in, wanted to memorize you. Sometimes his gaze was like a physical thing brushing along your skin. No one had ever looked at you the way Loki did. No one ever made you feel so...desired.

When he was finished, he brought his hands up to your shoulders and squeezed them fondly. It was a simple thing, but it made you realize how tense your shoulders had become over the past few weeks. You sighed, pleasure mixed with a tortured edge of pain, and he mumbled something under his breath and sat forward quickly.

“You’re all knots, darling! Why didn’t you say something?” The sweet-smelling lotion on your skin served as a makeshift massage oil as he redoubled his efforts, this time focusing on working the muscles in your shoulders. 

In truth, you hadn’t really realized how bad things were until just then. You always carried your stress and anxiety in your shoulders, so...they’d been sore for most of your life. The aches had always felt like a part of you, just another drawback of existing inside a human body. Loki muttered to himself about how hard you were working, how atrocious your posture was when you were using your computer, how you were the most stubborn little thing he’d ever known. You might have pulled away and tried to flee, if his voice wasn’t completely dripping with love for you. 

Before long, he pressed his hands against your shoulder blades and then got to his feet. For a moment, you thought he was finished, but then he grabbed one of your hands and pulled you to your feet as well. The towel slipped, and you fumbled for it with your free hand, but he pulled you in close to his body and wrapped his arms around you.

“To the bed,” he murmured, his breath warm against your ear. “I can’t possibly take proper care of you when you’re sitting up like that.”

You wanted to protest, assure him that you were fine, that he didn’t need to worry about you, but there was just something in his touch and the feel of his body against yours that stilled your tongue. Maybe you were finally beginning to realize that he rarely did anything that he didn’t actually want to do. If he wanted to try to ease the knots and tension in your muscles, he was going to do just that, and you had very little hope of stopping him. So you let him guide you into the bedroom and, when he wordlessly indicated that he wanted you to lie down, you obeyed without question and stretched out on your belly.

He hesitated for a few moments: you did not hear him move to join you. When you finally gathered the courage to lift your head to look at him, he was just...staring at you in wonder. He met your eyes and offered a tiny smile before finally climbing onto the bed beside you.

“Every day, you make me realize how lucky I am.” His voice was gruff. Though a thrill ran through you as he straddled your bottom, he did not do anything overly suggestive. Perhaps now was not the time for that. 

“I’m lucky too,” you said. Early on, you would never have guessed that Loki could possibly be so unrestrained and adoring in his praise of you, but it always made you feel a little self-conscious. His words were poetry. Yours were typically just...echoes. Just as you were trying to put together the right words to tell him how perfect he was, he found a stubborn knot in the small of your back and began to work on it. All you could do was moan. 

He worked tirelessly, mapping out the muscles in your back and somehow finding every single little spot of discomfort. The few massages you’d had in your life had always been a little bit painful and a _lot_ awkward, but Loki knew your body. He would work in a spot just until your skin grew tender and sensitive, and then he would go somewhere else for a bit to give you a break. There was love in his touch, instead of cool professionalism, and he frequently peppered your skin with kisses and gentle caresses. Early on, you struggled with your desire to fill the silence or try to entertain him with words, but each time you spoke, he seemed to find a spot that made you choke off your words with a moan, or a whimper, or a contented sigh. So you let yourself relax beneath him and only broke the silence when he did another bit of magic with your body.

When he was finished, he leaned forward to cover you with his body. He propped up his weight on his arms on either side of you on the mattress and kissed your cheek. 

“You are...wonderful,” you sighed. You were feeling a little bit drowsy now that he’d worked all of the tension out of you. You weren’t entirely aware of what you were saying: you only knew that he needed to know how much you appreciated him. “You’re like an angel. How did I get so lucky to have you? How are you here?”

He laughed quietly and rolled to the side, then pulled you into his arms. “I ask myself the very same questions every day, love.” He pulled the blanket up to cover the two of you, and then tightened his arms around you like he wouldn’t let you go. You napped together, nestled in the shared warmth of your bodies and the sweet scent of your lotion, until the sun became low and golden. This was safety. This was home.


End file.
